31 July 2009

the newspaper.com has an article about the recent united states supreme court decision in melendez-diaz v. massachusetts. the the case turns on the constitutional right to confront your accuser in court.

Red light camera and speed camera manufacturers fear that last month's US Supreme Court ruling in the case Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts could create legal turmoil for the industry.

The National Campaign to Stop Red Light Running issued a statement yesterday warning that the ruling has armed motorists with a greater ability to challenge the basis of automated traffic citations.

Speed cameras, for example, depend heavily on legal faith in a certificate that claims to confirm the total reliability of a machine's speed reading. In the Melendez-Diaz case, the high court ruled that merely producing such a certificate in court is insufficient.

Defendants have the right to cross-examine any individual who claims to have certified evidence.

in the 2009 regular louisiana legislative session, house bill no. 480, a bill by rep. cedric richmond and rep.jeff arnold to prohibit local governments from using mounted traffic cameras to issue traffic violations in louisiana, was heard by the house transportation committee.

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valiant lafayetter joel henderson testified to the committee and raised these same issues with them that the supreme court would agreed with him on just thirty-eight days later.

despite this, and common sense, nine australian redflex puppets on the committee voted to kill HB 480. this is the kind of criminals that we have running louisiana. they are not in the legislature to serve the people constitutionally -- they are there to serve special interests and lobbyists and government. we see this over and over...kinda like what we saw with the supreme court:

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justice scalia wrote the opinion and he was joined by justice stevens, justice souter, justice thomas and justice ginsburg. additionally, justice thomas wrote a concurring opinion.

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look how precariously our rights are teeter-tottering at the edge - a divided court in what should have been a no-brainer unanimous decision -- justice kennedy [ronnie raygun] wrote a very long 34 page dissent joined by chief justice roberts [jorge dubya boosh] (he's so pathetic that he cant remember the presidential oath of office - also found in the constitution, but he can remember to rule that you have no right to confront your accuser), justice breyer [william jefferson blythe clinton] and justice alito [jorge dubya boosh] in which they said that:

laboratory analysts who conduct routine scientific tests are not the kind of conventional witnesses to whom the confrontation clause refers. the judgment of the appeals court of massachusetts should be affirmed.